On November 27, 1914, German commander Paul von Hindenburg issues a triumphant proclamation from the battlefields of the Eastern Front, celebrating his army’s campaign against Russian forces in the Polish city of Warsaw.

On November 1, Hindenburg had been appointed commander in chief of all German troops on the Eastern Front; his chief of staff was Erich Ludendorff, who had aided him in commanding several earlier victories against Russian forces in East Prussia. The new command, dubbed OberOst, had two objectives: First, they were to mount a counterattack in Poland while their colleague, Erich von Falkenhayn, managed German forces fighting in the Ypres region on the Western Front. Second, they were to balance the faltering Austrian command headed by Conrad von Hotzendorff. Earlier, Conrad had audaciously blamed his army’s failure against Russia on a lack of sufficient German support and demanded that 30 new German divisions be sent east, a notion that Falkenhayn steadfastly opposed.

The German campaign against Warsaw, launched in early November 1914, aimed to draw Russian manpower and other resources away from their ferocious assault on the struggling army of Germany’s ally, Austria-Hungary. In this it proved successful. The Germans scored several significant victories, most notably at the neighboring city of Lodz. Though the broader German assault ultimately failed, leaving Warsaw still in Russian hands, the kaiser rewarded Hindenburg by promoting him to field marshal, the highest rank in the German army.

In his statement of November 27, Hindenburg expressed his satisfaction with the results of the campaign and, of course, with his promotion. "I am proud at having reached the highest military rank at the head of such troops. Your fighting spirit and perseverance have in a marvelous manner inflicted the greatest losses on the enemy. Over 60,000 prisoners, 150 guns and about 200 machine guns have fallen into our hands, but the enemy is not yet annihilated. Therefore, forward with God, for King and Fatherland, till the last Russian lies beaten at our feet.

A force called The Women Police Volunteers (later renamed The Women Police Service) began operating in the very early days of World War I , working alongside but independent of the Metropolitan Police. These women, however, had no powers of arrest, and no warrant cards, only identity cards. This group was formed to deter the exploitation of refugees fleeing the Germans, and to tackle the capital’s increasing problem with prostitution.

It was not though in London that the first WPC started work, but in Grantham in Lincolnshire, another feminist first for the town that where Margaret Thatcher , Britain’s first female Prime Minister, was born.

Mrs Edith Smith was a member of the Women Police Service, called in by Lincolnshire’s Chief Constable to help deal with the upsurge in prostitution in the area because huge numbers of new army recruits were billeted there for training. Such was the seriousness of the problem that the Town Council and local Watch Committee were persuaded by the Chief Constable to allow her to be sworn in with full powers of arrest.

A photograph of Mrs Smith shows a formidable young woman with a strong jaw and, behind her plain spectacles, a determined look to her eyes. She remained in the town until she quit the force in 1918, exhausted by years of working seven days a week. Tragically she committed suicide five years later, taking an overdose of morphia. Grantham’s Guildhall Museum (which was used as a makeshift jail when she served in the town) has a display dedicated to her memory.

27 November 1914 → Written Answers (Commons): LONDON SCOTTISH REGIMENT.

Mr. NIELD asked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether any information has been received as to the whereabouts of Private H. W. J. Bryan, 1330 D Company, and Private S. W. Hewelt, 1310 H Company of the London Scottish Regiment; whether these men or either of them have been wounded; and, if so, when and in what manner; and whether he is aware that all attempts to communicate with them or to ascertain particulars have failed, that telegrams sent to the commanding officer remain unanswered and unacknowledged, and that applications to the War Office by the parents of the men have likewise failed to elicit any information?

Mr. TENNANT The War Office have no information of any casualty to these men and cannot trace that there has been any previous inquiry about them. If there is any ground for supposing that either of them is wounded and the facts are furnished, inquiry will be made at once.

Paul von Hindenburg's Army Order Following the German Attack on Warsaw, 27 November 1914

Reproduced below is German Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg's Army Order issued on 27 November 1914 in the wake of the German assault upon Warsaw.

Although the German attack was ultimately unsuccessful it did include notable successes along the way (chiefly at Lodz). Hindenburg's triumphant tone is perhaps understandable given that the campaign had brought him a military promotion at the hands of Kaiser Wilhelm II to the rank of Field Marshal.

German Army Order at the Eastern Front, 27 November 1914

In the course of severe fighting lasting several days my troops have brought to a standstill the offensive of a numerically superior Russian army.

[Note: The Army Order reproduces a telegram from the Kaiser, in which the latter, after congratulating the commander on his new success and that of his troops, thanks him for protecting the eastern frontier. The Kaiser adds that he cannot better express his thanks than by promoting the General to the rank of Field Marshal.]

I am proud at having reached the highest military rank at the head of such troops. Your fighting spirit and perseverance have in a marvellous manner inflicted the greatest losses on the enemy.

Over 60,000 prisoners, 150 guns and about 200 machine guns have fallen into our hands, but the enemy is not yet annihilated.

Therefore, forward with God, for King and Fatherland, till the last Russian lies beaten at our feet. Hurrah!

Conscription - At the age of twenty Frenchmen were called forward for their period of Military Service. This is an idea stretching back to the days of the Revolution when the defence of the country became a matter not just for the army but for the nation. It was the duty for every able bodied man to defend the motherland - often by attacking somebody else's !

Having served his two years (in 1913 it was increased to three), the soldier passed into the Reserve for eleven years during which time he would be called up so many times a year to continue with his training. At this stage he would be transferred to the Territorial Army for seven years.

Whilst serving as a Reservist and a Territorial the soldier would be called up in case of war. It was only when he had finished his time with the Territorials and had passed into their reserve for yet another seven years that in theory he would only be called up if things were desperate.

As a guide, infantry regiments were made up of three active or two reserve battalions, but the numbering of the battalions was consecutive: 1,2 and 3 plus 4 and 5. A battalion would have been about 800 strong.

One difference between the French system and that of the British is that French Regiments fought as an entire unit, the battalions remaining together. The British fought by battalions with no requirement for the 2nd battalion to be in the same brigade as the 1st.

If you are looking at French infantry regimental numbers they are reasonably easy to distinguish. Simplest of all RIT means a Territorial Unit - Régiment d'Infanterie Territoriale - and thus made up of men who were at least 34 years old.

Those marked RI - Régiment d'Infanterie - form the Active and Reserve regiments. Each Active regiment had a reserve whose number was 200 more than the parent unit.

Thus the 298è RI were the Reserve Regiment for the 98è RI. In essence if you can subtract 200 from the regimental number it is a reserve unit. Of course by the end of the war the distinction between the two classes had become blurred as new conscripts were sent to wherever they were needed most.

The fighting for Vingré : November 1914 - Following the 1st Battle of the Marne in September 1914 the German army was forced to retreat in the prelude to the Race to the Sea. The plateau of Confrécourt dominates the Aisne in this sector and the fighting for a while became quite intense.

It should be remembered that at this stage in the war trenches were extremely rudimentary and were often little more than connected fox holes. The task of digging the line that would soon stretch from the coast to the Swiss border was only just beginning.

One of the French Regiments that had distinguished itself at the Battle of the Marne was the 298è RI, a Reserve Infantry Regiment made up of soldiers from Roanne on the Loire. Storming the German positions they had captured the colours of the German 36th Regiment of Fusiliers. For this feat of arms their own were decorated with the Légion d'honneur at Ambleny on the 11th November 1914. In gaining their battle honours though the regiment had lost more than half its effective strength.

The area around Vingré quietened down but localised sporadic attacks were still the order of the day.

27th November 1914 - On the 27th November the 1st Section of the 19th Company were occupying the front line and were receiving a bombardment which lasted some time. Eventually deciding to pull back they left eight look-outs to watch for any possible enemy encroachment.

At 1700 hours the canon stopped and the German infantry rushed the French trenches quickly capturing the hapless look-outs. Things changed for the worst when the German infantry continued their advance deeper into the French positions and came up against soldiers of the 2nd Section who had no idea that the 1st had already pulled back.

The French withdrew onto their Section position where 2nd Lieutenant Paulaud decided that he risked being outflanked. Paulaud thus gave the order to retire on the support lines where the situation could be re-assessed and a counter-attack organised.

Having carried out those orders the 2nd Section is immediately ordered by their Company Commander: Lieutenant Paupier, to retake the front line, which they do, the Germans having already retired with their prisoners.

In effect, a skirmish where apart from the loss of a couple of men the line remained exactly where it had been at the commencement of the bombardment.

The repercussions - Unfortunately for the soldiers of the 5th and 6th Squads who had been the troops bumped by the German infiltration, the Divisional General saw things differently and condemned the men to 8 Days in the front line for their lack of ardour.

His report was duly passed up the line to General Étienne de Villaret at Corps Headquarters.

The general was a strict disciplinarian and had issued an order on the 20th October 1914 stating that full use should be made of Special Courts Martial. Salutary examples would soon put an end to any lack of enthusiasm.

Villaret was incensed by the lack of moral fibre shown by the two squads and convened a Special Court Martial. The charge was: Abandonment of their posts in the face of the enemy. A charge that carried only one penalty - death.

These Special Courts Martial had been decreed on the 6th September. Three judges, accused caught red-handed, execution - all within 24 hours. In addition, there was no recourse to an appeal against a Special Court Martial.

The soldiers themselves though were confident. It was all being done for show, they had followed their orders, by the end of the action the position had been maintained.

The Court Martial - At 1500 hours on the 3rd December 1914 2nd Lieutenant Bodé of the 18th Company was ordered to represent the accused. He had only just come out of the front line and knew nothing at all about the case in hand.

He was given two hours to speak with the 24 prisoners.

At 1700 hours the Court was convened under the presiding council of the Regimental Commander: Lt Colonel Pinoteau.

For the defence, Bodé pointed out that the suddenness of the Germans' arrival due to the thinly held adjacent positions had forced the men back, but there was no panic within the ranks, they retired in an orderly fashion, sought instructions and acted upon them. Having moved back and reorganised they then acted on further orders to retake their original positions.

For the prosecution, Procureur Lieutenant Achalme rejected the entire defence and insisted on seeking the death penalty for all 24 of the accused. Furthermore, he declared, 2nd Lt Paulaud had in fact ordered the position to be retaken immediately: he had never given the order to retire !

In the face of such a blatant cover up of his own actions by Paulaud, Bodé could only fall back on the excellent conduct of all of those who stood before the court.

The trial finished at 1930 hours.

The 24 accused were told to line up as they would have been in the trench and the six to the right were condemned to death. The decision had been reached the night before and the entire process had been a charade. Villaret wanted them to be made examples of what would happen to all other cowards.

The Victims - The six soldiers who had been chosen all but at random were:

The court decided that as the enemy had come from the right, the panic had started there. Those on the right were the most guilty.

In fact both Floch and Gay had been captured in the initial rush of the position and only managed to escape again during a momentary lapse of concentration by their guards.

As Floch stated in his last letter: I die innocent of the crime of abandoning my post. If instead of escaping from the Germans I had remained a prisoner, my life would have been safe.

Quinaud and Pettelet hadn't even been on the right, but the way they had given their evidence seemed to point that way.

Flawed defence - Apart from the fact that Bodé was not aware of the full facts here was another flaw in the defence; in trying to answer all the questions put to them as fully as possible the soldiers themselves acted in the naive belief that the system would protect them.

As one of those not chosen remarked afterwards. In 1914 they had faith in the system. If the same incident had happened in 1917 the replies to the questions would not have been so obliging to the prosecution.

Execution : 4th December 1914 - The six men spent the night of the 3rd December under guard and were led out the following morning at 0730 hours to six posts, six firing squads, and a waiting battalion, as it was the custom to make sure that everyone else in the condemned soldier's unit - got the message.

On a single order 72 rounds were fired, the six were declared dead and the Battalion was paraded past the corpses to the sound of bugles.

Following the execution 2nd Lt Paulaud told his orderly that Innocent men had just died.

The aftermath - In 1919 a number of movements including those of the Veterans Associations started demanding the rehabilitation of numerous victims of firing squads.

It should be realised that without an honourable death and the mention: Mort pour la France, the widow of a dead soldier received nothing. If the death had been by execution then the family also had to suffer the humiliation of being shunned by the community. Mme Floch found herself being refused service in shops. The children of the executed were taunted at school often to the point of their having to be withdrawn from classes. Other family members could find it hard to get work, being connected to cowards who had deserved to be shot.

In the case of the Vingré six the Court of Appeal (Cour de Cassation) met on the 29th January 1921. A number of points were put forward by the families through their representatives.

•There had been no panic in the 2nd Section, they had followed the orders of their leader: 2nd Lt Paulaud
•The withdrawl had been inevitable given the situation
•Paulaud had lied to the investigators
•The decision to shoot six men had been taken before the case had even been heard

The decision of the court was that the men should be reinstated and on the 4th February were classified as: Morts pour la France. They were all granted the Médaille Militaire and the Croix de Guerre posthumously. The widows would benefit from the war pensions which would be back dated.

This was all very fine but there was a feeling that justice would not have been done until those responsible had themselves been brought to justice.

Paulaud was almost certainly the only officer ever brought up before a Court Martial for an act in connection with a dubious trial. He was charged with perjury and to the amazement of the families, was acquitted.

Mr. WILLIAM THORNE asked the First Lord of the Admiralty, if it has been the custom to allow the men serving in the Royal Fleet Naval Reserve to wear a moustache; if he is aware that an order has just been given out that those men must shave off their moustaches; and if he intends taking any action in the matter?

Dr. MACNAMARA The wearing of a moustache only is forbidden by the King's Regulations, but this is not usually enforced in the case of Reserve men during peace. On being "called out" they become a part of the Navy proper, and as such would be expected to conform to the Regulations of the Service. If the men objected to shaving their moustaches, they are at liberty to discontinue the use of the razor altogether.

James Connolly: “Enlist or Starve”Workers’ Republic, 27 November 1915.

The above seem to represent the attitude of the ruling class to the people of Ireland at present. They represent the dilemma in which the worker finds himself who tries to act up to the dictates of his conscience. The employer whom an absurd social system makes the arbiter of his means of living tells him that he must go and enlist, even should his whole soul cry out in revolt against the degradation of fighting for his own and his country’s enemies. That if he does not go he will be thrown on the streets in idleness, and that every other employer will refuse to give him work. That he must enlist or starve.

A meeting of Dublin employers was held on Tuesday in the Mansion House under the chairmanship of the Lord Mayor, and at the direct command of the Lord Lieutenant who attended in person. Before attending each employer received a circular marked ‘private and confidential’ asking him to bring to the meeting a full list of all his employees of military age who could be dispensed with, or replaced by older men, boys, or women.

All the employers who locked out their workers in 1913 were there in person or through their representatives. Mr Wm. Martin Murphy, ever prominent in anything that savours of an attack upon popular rights, sent a letter promising his hearty co-operation, and the secretary of the Dublin Employers Association was prominent and zealous in the evil work.

All these employers pointed out to each other in their private conversations that every active trade unionist, or other person of independent mind, could be put first upon the list of eligible men, and that all blacklegs, pimps, and toadies could be certified as ‘indispensable’, and the military would do the rest. Thus trade unionism could be destroyed by sacrificing the trade unionist to the military press gang now being organised.

Thus all the plans are being laid for a wholesale, well organised, and persistent victimisation of the working class. Every man of military age is to be given the choice of slaughter abroad or starvation at home. The Employers are planning well. Their father in Hell could not have done it better.

Behind this terrible conspiracy against the lives of the poor there looms up also the spectre of conscription – a conspiracy against the life and honour of the nation. Lord Derby [1] and his associates have told us that if by such means as the foregoing they do not get enough recruits before November 30th all the unmarried men will be compelled to serve. When the unmarried men are exhausted, that is to say when they are all killed or wounded, the married men will be seized and sent out as food for cannon.

The carrying out of this plan means the end of the historic Irish nation.

The peaceful carrying out of it means that the Irish Nation will end in dishonour.

Will it so end? Could anything be worse than such an end?

Mr Redmond and his supporters tell us that it is useless to struggle against the Empire, that we should devote all our powers to the task of pleasing the Government by services to the Empire. That we might win by favours what we cannot gain by struggling, and that the sole hope of Ireland is to win reward by giving pleasure.

It is a prostitute’s argument. The argument of the street walker who sneers at the poverty of her honest and virtuous sister, and flaunts her jewels as a proof that the ways of sin are more profitable than the paths of virtue.

And yet this argument that Ireland as a nation should seek to win her nationhood by advertising her prostitution – that is the last word in the statesmanship of the Home Rule party and its leaders.

Was ever nation so beset by its enemies? Was ever nation so betrayed by its friends?

Comrades! Scripture tells us that the fool hath his eyes on the ends of the earth. Are all our leaders fools? Do none of them turn their eyes from the red glare of battle abroad to note the swift poisoning of the race at home, encouraged by enemies sleepless in their hatred?

The Queen's Own Dorset Yeomen had been withdrawn from Gallipoli to Murdros to rest and refit, numbering just sixty-five men, under command of a Lieutenant. Here ten officers and fifty-seven men joined the Regiment but the decision had already been taken to withdraw the force from the Gallipoli Peninsular. Consequently, the Yeoman embarked on HMS Hannibal on 27th November 1915 arriving at the Egyptian port of Alexandria before entraining for Cairo. Here they joined the rear party of forty-two men that by now principally consisted of sick or convalescing men but a draft of 11 officers and 133 men brought the QODY up to a descent strength, under Temporary Lieutenant Colonel Godden. Another draft of twenty-five men joined the Regiment and at the same time, the Dorset Yeomen took over 114 troop horses from the Bucks Yeomanry, thus resuming their mounted status.

HMA No. 9r was a rigid airship designed and built by Vickers Ltd at Walney Island just off Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria. First flying on 27 November 1916, it was the first successful British 'rigid' design, and it provided many hours of valuable training and experimental data for British airship crews and designers. (...)

On 16 November 1916, No. 9r left her shed and was moored outside for final shakedown and checking of the fittings and engines, with the first test flight taking place on 27 November 1916. This was the first time a British rigid airship had taken flight; however, it turned out that she was unable to lift her contract weight of 3.1 tons (2.8 tonnes). Consequently she was lightened by the removal of both rear engines (...)

Charlie's War: The Diary and Letters of a Canadian CorporalBy Alex Francis, 2010-10-15

Canadian-born Charlie Ross Francis joined up in 1915, aged 26. His diary and letters home are testimony to his dutiful service in World War One, but was his experience as a corporal in an Empire force any different to that of a British officer? Alex Francis tells his grandfather's story.

27 November 1916 (diary): 'This evening was the most exciting of any since I came over... we were told that a mine on our left would be set off that night. Presently on the given time... we heard a dull thud, felt the ground shake, and with a noise more like a hiss than anything, a great sheet of white flame poured towards the sky, accompanied by smoke and great volumes of earth which seemed to rise 300 feet [about 90 metres] in the air. It lasted only a few seconds, but before it subsided our batteries opened up in all force. The noise was awful, nothing seemed coherent, it seemed to me our heavy and light artillery, trench mortars, stokes guns and machine guns made a ceiling of rushing steel above our heads. Flares of all sorts were thrown up, making with the various explosions a strange and weird light.

'The enemy did not return fire for some minutes, but when they did the tumult increased and above all could be heard the crash of the explosions of their 'Minnies'. They somehow got a direct hit on one of our explosive dumps which exploded with a detonation louder than anything I ever heard. It seemed to rock the very earth and we thought that Fritz had set off a counter-mine almost under us. Debris of all kinds fell about us and on us, but none near me was hit, tho' when Mr Mitchell, our acting OC was killed, he was just up the trench a short piece. The bombardment lasted about 40 minutes and ceased and things resumed the semi-activity of previous nights.

John Harold Rhodes VC DCM & Bar (17 May 1891 – 27 November 1917) was an English recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces.

Rhodes was born in Packmore, Stoke On Trent, Staffordshire, son of ex-soldier and miner Ernie Rhodes. He was educated in Newchapel and later became a miner at the Chatterly Whitfield Colliery. Around 1910, however, he joined the Grenadier Guards and served for three years, after which he returned to the colliery. On the outbreak of World War I John was recalled to the forces as a reservist. Now 26 years old, and a Lance-Sergeant in the 3rd Battalion, Grenadier Guards, British Army during the First World War John won the Distinguished Conduct Medal on 17th May 1915 and three months later was awarded a bar to this medal. While back in England recovering from his wounds, John married but was not destined to live to see the resulting child.

Back on the front-line, the following deed took place at the Battle of Poelcapelle for which John was awarded the VC and also the Croix De Guerre:

No. 15122 L./Sjt. John Harold Rhodes, G.Gds. (Tunstall, Staffs.).

For most conspicuous bravery when in charge of a Lewis gun section covering the consolidation of the right front company. He accounted for several enemy with hisrifle as well as by Lewis gun fire, and, upon seeing three enemy leave a "pill-box", he went out single-handed through our own barrage and hostile machine-gun fire, and effected an entry into the "pill-box". He there captured nine enemy, including a forward observation officer connected by telephone with his battery. These prisoners he brought back with him, together with valuable information.

He was killed in action, Fontaine Notre Dame, France, on 27 November 1917 and buried at Rocquigny-Equancourt Road British Cemetery, Manancourt.

His Victoria Cross is displayed at The Guards Regimental Headquarters (Grenadier Guards RHQ) in London, England.

A memorial plaque was unveiled at Chatterley Whitfield Mining Museum on 20th April 1984.

Insisting that Bourlon be taken and forever worrying that the enemy were on the point of collapse Haig told Byng to take over personal control of the battle. On the 26th the artillery began pounding the German lines in preparation for an assault by the Guards Division against Fontaine and the 62nd Division against Bourlon.

At 0620 hours the following morning 2nd Guards Brigade advanced. 3rd Grenadiers up the main road, 1st Coldstreams in the centre and 2nd Irish between the village and Bourlon Wood.

Initially going forward without the tanks they were soon overtaken by the machines. The Guards suffered enormous losses as they advanced against enfilading fire from La Folie wood and became embroiled in house to house fighting.

The situation was intolerable and by 1300 hours it was over. Despite great courage and tenacity the Guardsmen had been overwhelmed by an entrenched enemy in superior numbers.

It was much the same story for the 62nd Division. Major General Bradford VC was ordered to take his 186th Brigade into the wood and clear the remaining Germans out of the northern sector. His men from the Duke of Wellington's Regiment pushed on through the wood and reached the village on the far side but it was impossible to advance further in the face of German artillery fire.

Against Bourlon village 2/5th York and Lancaster and 2/5th Kings Own Yorkshire Light Infantry were supported by eleven tanks from F Battalion.

They managed to get into the village only to find that it had escaped great damage from the bombardment and the German defenders had taken the time to barricade every street and alleyway. To deal with the tanks the Germans had hidden field artillery pieces within the village.

Only five of the tanks returned when after two hours of fighting the attack was called off.

The British had worn themselves out. The line was not going to be broken and swept away and Haig had not had the victory that would have redeemed himself in the eyes of the politicians back home. Italy was still clamouring for aid, Divisions would have to be sacrificed on the Western Front to rescue them.

Haig gave the instructions that the line should be consolidated: they would dig in.

Stapleton Hollett served with the Essex County Constabulary from April 15, 1913 until 5th August 1914 when he was recalled to the Grenadier Guards on the outbreak of war, serving initially with the 2nd Battalion. He was killed in action on Tuesday 27 November 1917 at the age of 27 while serving in the 3rd Battalion, Grenadier Guards.

Named after his blacksmith father, Stapleton Hollett was born in Ash, Kent, to Alice Hollett. She was widowed in 1919, at which time she was living at Elm Tree Cottage in Melliker Road, Hook Green, Kent.

He served with the Essex Constabulary at Harwich from 15th April 1913 until 5th August 1914 when he was recalled to the Grenadier Guards on the outbreak of war, serving initially with the 2nd Battalion. He wrote to a colleague back in Harwich, in a letter published by the Essex County Chronicle (5 February 1915):

“We are having the weather a bit better out here lately, and all the boys are in the best of spirits. We have four in my Company who have won the DCM. Our Regiment has done some splendid work. If you know one or two who want to get an honourable name tell them to join the Guards, they will never regret it…I’ve seen some horrible sights and one day I hope to be able to tell you some of my experiences.”

Stapleton Hollett, who was unmarried, was killed in action on Tuesday 27 November 1917 at the age of 27 while serving in the 3rd Battalion, Grenadier Guards as Sergeant 14729. He has no known grave and is commemorated on panel 2 of the Cambrai Memorial near Louveral in Nord, France.

This newspaper reprinted the letter Clifton Cates wrote to his mother and sister.
From the Clifton B. Cates Collection (COLL/3157) at the Marine Corps Archives and Special Collections. OFFICIAL USMC PHOTOGRAPH.

The Titles Deprivation Act 1917 is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom according to which enemies of the United Kingdom during the First World War could be deprived of their peerage and royal titles. Its long title was An Act to deprive Enemy Peers and Princes of British Dignities and Titles. It received royal assent on 8 November 1917. (...)

The First World War broke out following the assassination of the heir presumptive to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, by a Serbian nationalist in June 1914. The United Kingdom entered the war against Germany and its allies in August.

The British Royal Family was closely related to its German enemies. Queen Victoria married the German Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, whose German titles passed eventually to the descendants of their youngest son Leopold, Duke of Albany. Victoria's eldest daughter, also named Victoria, married Frederick III, German Emperor. Thus George V was a first cousin of William II, German Emperor and of Charles Edward, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. A more distant relative was Ernest Augustus, Crown Prince of Hanover, who was descended in the male line from George III and thus was a Prince of Great Britain & Ireland.

Many members of the German royal families enjoyed British royal or noble titles leading to a call for the deprivation of their titles. In 1915, several Knights of the Most Noble Order of the Garter were struck off the Rolls of the Order; but peerage titles cannot be withdrawn except by Act of Parliament. In 1917, therefore, the Parliament passed the Titles Deprivation Act authorising the deprivation of peerage titles, as well as princely dignities.

The Act allowed the King to establish a committee of the Privy Council, which was to include at least two members of the Judicial Committee. The committee was empowered to take evidence and report the names of British peers or princes who served in an enemy military force, or rendered assistance to or voluntarily resided in an enemy nation. The report would then be laid before both Houses of Parliament; if neither House passed a motion disapproving of the report within forty days, it was to be submitted to the King, whereupon the persons named therein would lose all British dignities.

Thereafter, a successor of a person thus deprived of a peerage is allowed to petition the Crown for restoration thereof; the petition is to be referred to a committee of the Privy Council, which may recommend whether the petitioner be reinstated or not.

Under the Act, the King appointed to the committee:

The Lord Finlay (Lord Chancellor)
The Viscount Sandhurst (Lord Chamberlain of the Household)
The Marquess of Lansdowne
The Marquess of Crewe
The Lord Newton
The Lord Stamfordham (Private Secretary to the Sovereign)
The Lord Sumner (a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary)

The committee was established by an Order in Council issued by the King on 27 November 1917.

Built in 1914 as the German flag merchant steamer Kamilla Rickmers, and seized when the United States entered World War I, this ship was renamed Ticonderoga in August 1917. She was placed in commission as USS Ticonderoga (ID # 1958) on 5 January 1918, and sunk, with the loss of 213 lives, by the German submarine U-152 on 30 September 1918.

Son of Mrs Emily Woodcroft
Aged 19 years
Died 27th November 1917
Commemorated at Ramleh War Cemetery, Israel.
Grave C.36.

The Rushden Echo Friday 21 December 1917 - A Rushden Soldier Family - A South Africa War Veteran's Bereavement - Pte G Woodcroft Killed in Egypt

We are sorry to learn that Mrs H Woodcraft, of 102 High street south, Rushden, has received official news of the death in action in Egypt on November 27th of her youngest son, Pte George Woodcroft, of the Northants Regiment, at the age of 19 years.

The deceased soldier, who joined up at the age of 16 years, only went to Egypt in August last. He was formerly employed by Messrs. Robinson Bros, boot manufacturers, Rushden, and he was also a member of the Rushden Boy Scouts.

Mrs Woodcroft has another soldier son, viz., Corpl T J Woodcroft, of the Argyl and Sutherland Highlanders, who contracted sand-fly fever in Egypt, and who has been in hospital at Alexandria. He is now better and has rejoined his battalion.

The father, who is also an ex-solder, is one of the original Expeditionary Force, was wounded at the battle of Mons. He also fought in the South Africa war.

Kettering Leader, 28th December 1917 - A Rushden Soldier Family

Mrs. H. Woodcroft, of 102, High-street South, Rushden, has received the sad news, officially, of the death of her youngest son, Pte. George Woodcroft, of the Northants Regiment. The deceased joined up at 16 years of age, and went to Egypt in August last. He was only 19 years of age, and was formerly a Boy Scout. The father is one of the original Expeditionary Force, and also served in South Africa. He was wounded at Mons.

From Scarborough, Wilfred Owen wrote to Siegfried Sassoon on 27th November 1917, "I trust you'll like SOLDIER'S DREAM well enough to pass it on to the NATION or Cambridge." He'd left Craiglockhart at the end of October and it's likely that this particular poem was the last to emanate from the place that had changed his life.

"I dreamed….." it opens. Twice before, at Craiglockhart, Owen had elegised his dreams.

The statement in the new book West that Waikumete Cemetery is "home to a mass grave filled with most of the 1128 Aucklanders who died in the influenza epidemic of 1918” still had me going this past week. Such a statement is contradicted not only by Geoffrey W. Rice in his extremely good reference on the 1918 influenza pandemic in New Zealand, Black November, 1988, reprinted 2005 (with a specific chapter on the effect in Auckland) – but even in the conservation plan for Waikumete Cemetery produced for the Waitakere City Council itself (the local body that backed the West book):

“In 1918-1919 following the end of the First World War, there was a catastrophic outbreak of Spanish pneumonic influenza that caused a large number of burials in a short period of time. In the autumn of 1918 the disease spread quickly from country to country, resulting in a heavy death toll … The railway line to Waikumete station played an important role in transporting the dead, particularly when the number of deaths reached its peak in the third and fourth weeks of November 1918. Auckland recorded the nation’s highest death toll of 1,680. From 1-26 November there were 469 interments at Waikumete.”

Even that history isn’t completely correct. The figure of 469 interments was taken from the report by Auckland’s City Engineer to the Mayor of Auckland on 27 November 1918. Rice amends that to 444 burials at Waikumete related to the influenza outbreak (as there were, of course, burials resulting from other causes during that period), and puts the total Auckland influenza toll at 1128, agreeing with Matthew Gray. Still, 444 burials out of 1128 deaths still doesn’t mean that Waikumete Cemetery is where “most” of those who died were buried. Just over a third, yes.

•Between August and December 1914, 90 of our 230 employees had joined the British Army.

•Some were enlisted into the Army Veterinary Corps (AVC) which, when war broke out, consisted of only 109 officers, all veterinary surgeons, and 322 other ranks.

•We immediately helped the AVC by sending two horse ambulances, sheepskins, waterproof rugs and 50,000 books on lameness and first aid.

•We began to train 200 men, excluding our own inspectors, for enlistment in the AVC.

•By 1915, over 50 per cent of RSPCA inspectors and other staff were serving with the armed forces.

•By the end of the First World War, the AVC had grown to 1,300 officers and 33,000 other ranks.

•Of the 2.5 million injured animals admitted to the AVC during this war, 80 per cent were treated and returned to duty, and on 27 November 1918 the AVC received Royal patronage for its outstanding contribution to animal welfare, becoming the RAVC as it is known today.

Corporal Golding of the 8th Battalion Leicestershire Regiment describes the conditions at Langensalza POW camp and the killing of Private Berty Tucker of the 2/8th Worcestershire Regiment by the camp guards on the 27th November 1918.

The following account by Corporal Golding (235590) of the 8th Battalion Leicestershire Regiment describes the conditions at Langensalza POW camp and the killing of Private Berty Tucker of the 2/8th Worcestershire Regiment by the camp guards on the 27th November 1918.

I was captured on 28th May 1918 with about 40 other men of my regiment, the rest of my battalion having been taken prisoners on the day previous.

We were sent with a party of about 1000 prisoners made up at Amifontaine and Hirson to Langensalza, where we arrived nine days after our capture—on June 6th.

We were first of all put into an isolation camp, but the accommodation was abominable. One thousand men were quartered .in three overcrowded barrack huts, and we suffered great discomfort. After a fortnight they moved us into the main camp, where I remained during the whole time of my captivity.

Towards the end of July I was put on the British Help Committee, The principal part of my duties was clerical work, such as writing letters, making lists, etc.

Captain Alexander was commandant at Langensalza when I arrived, and he continued to be in office until November 9th, when he was removed by the Soldiers' Council, and Sergeant-major Koch, who up to this time had been a Feldwebel, was elected commandant of the "troops" in his place. After the armistice was declared we never heard of Captain Alexander again or of General Scholtz, the general of the camp.

Whilst I was at Langensalza Captain Alexander was very strict indeed. We had been told that he was well disposed towards the British prisoners, but he allowed no indulgence or privileges of any sort to the British N.C.O.'s. In my opinion, he could have done a good deal to improve the conditions of the camp, and particularly the sanitation, which was very bad indeed. Had he wished to do so, I think also that he might have done something to relieve the British prisoners who came into Langensalza from working behind the lines. These men were in a terrible state of emaciation, without clothing, when the Help Committee were able to give them food, and although they nearly all went to hospital, the only medical comforts and food they got came from the Help Committee.

The day after the armistice was declared, Captain von Marschall arrived in the camp. He was called the commanding officer of the camp, but he seemed to have no authority at all, and every order he signed had to be counter-signed by Feldwebel Koch, the elected commandant of the camp. Feldwebel Koch seemed to be supreme, and if ever any information was required as to transport and repatriation by the prisoners, they were always referred to him. Before his election Feldwebel Koch was in charge, of a company of French prisoners, but I do not think he had been Feldwebel very long, and we were told that he had come back from the front quite recently. Koch could not speak English, and he seemed to have very little authority over his subordinates.

All arrangements for transport and repatriation were left to the bureau of the British company, which was responsible for making out all lists, etc. The bureau was in charge of Feldwebel Rost and a couple of German clerks, but after the armistice he was replaced by Sergeant Ludwig, a man who was civil to the prisoners, but quite unable to do the work of the bureau, so everything had to be left to the British N.C.O.'s.

Feldwebel Rost was specially hard and brutal in his treatment of prisoners. In July 1918 I witnessed the following incident.

The prisoners were on parade, and many of them, being cripples, had difficulty in moving out of the huts. Rost rushed into the barrack, and, without giving the maimed men the time to get out, he caught hold of a private who was very badly wounded in the abdomen, and had to walk with a slick, by the back of the neck and threw him violently down the steps. This is only one of the many instances of his bullying; he was also responsible for sending many men to the salt mines who were quite unfit to go there. The full name of this man is Feldwebel Rost, 6th Company; he lived at Jena, and his occupation is students' servant.

Shooting at. Langensalza.—On November 27th, at 1 p.m. we had just finished our dinner in the British Help Committee hut, and we heard an unusual bugle-call. Three of us went out. The hut was situated about 15 yards from the sentry box at the gate, which led to the tailors' and bootmakers' shops, and was about 30 yards from the theatre. The theatre contained dressing rooms, which had been put up by the prisoners, one for each nationality. At this time these dressing-rooms were being pulled down and prisoners used the woodwork for fuel. When I came out from the Help Committee hut I saw that the theatre was surrounded by a group of about 20 or 30 of different nationalities. There was no disturbance or riot of any kind, and the prisoners were only going in and out of the theatre carrying pieces of wood from their respective dressing rooms.

After the bugle call about 30 soldiers, with an under-officer in charge, named Krause, came out of the Landsturm barrack, which was situated some 40 yards from the Help Committee hut and about 40 yards from the theatre. The soldiers surrounded the British Help Committee hut and the theatre in extended order. I was standing near the gate, about 6 yards away from the under-officer. He said to me in broken English, “What are you making trouble for?" I replied "There is no trouble at all." and I asked him why the soldiers were surrounding the theatre and our hut, but he made no answer. I remained where I was between the committee hut and the gate, and after an interval of three minutes I heard him give the order to fire. I am quite certain that he gave the order to fire, for I had often heard it given before when at the front. There must have been 15 to 20 prisoners standing outside the hut, and I should say about 30 others round the theatre. When the order to fire was given, I tried to get into the committee hut, but the door was so crowded by others endeavouring to do the same that I could not get in. At least 15 shots were fired in the direction of the committee hut, with the result that Private Tucker, Worcester Regiment, who was standing 8 or 9 yards from me, was killed instantly, receiving three bullets; Private Morey, East Yorks, standing 10 yards from the hut, was also killed, being shot in the head. Corporal Elrod, 6th Northumberland Fusiliers, must have been 60 yards away from the theatre, near the football ground; he was hit by a bullet in the spine, from the effects of which he died eight hours afterwards. Two of the men who were trying to get through the door of the hut were wounded—Private F. Johnson, 4th Bedfordshire Regiment, and Private Haig, West Yorks—and there were three bullet marks in the committee hut door. Private Johnson told me that when the firing commenced he threw himself flat on the ground, and that when he tried to crawl into the hut he was fired at again by the soldiers.

When the firing was over, the under-officer (Krause) Approached Private Haig, who was lying on the ground, and said to him, “Why did you not get out of the way when I told you to go?" Haig said, in reply, that Krause had never told him to do so.

Shortly afterwards Company Sergeant-major Thomas, Somerset Light Infantry, Sergeant. Major R. S. Finch, Northumberland Fusiliers, and I, went to the kommandantur, where we found Captain von Marschall. We asked him if he was responsible for the firing which had taken place. He said no, because he was away from the camp at the time. He was asked from whom the prisoners could obtain satisfaction, and he referred us to the officer of justice, Feldwebel Lieutenant. This officer typed down my evidence, which was interpreted by Dolmetscher Weither. Some days later I gave the same evidence to a judge, a civilian, who examined me, and again a few days after a major from the War Office took my evidence. I asked this officer to forward it to England, and he said that the evidence would go there through one of the ambassadors.

The under-officer Krause gave his evidence at the same time, and he denied that he had ever given the order to fire, but I am quite certain that I heard him give this order.

About a week after the occurrence I saw Krause in Langensalza Camp at liberty and in civilian clothes. I heard that he had obtained his discharge and was living in lodgings in Langensalza.

After the armistice we were allowed to go in and out of the camp, and I left on 12th January 1919.

Examiner’s Note
Corporal Golding, who is a very intelligent witness, has made a rough sketch of the part of the camp where the shooting occurrence took place, which shows the positions of the soldiers, the position of the under-officer, and the spots where Private Tucker, Private Morey. Corporal Elrod were killed and Privates Haig and Johnson were wounded. He seems to be very positive that Under-officer Krause gave the order to fire.

3rd February 1919

NOTES - Explanation about Fedwebel
Feldwebel gained its widest usage under the German military beginning from the early 19th century. The highest ranking Non-Commissioned Officer until 1918, the Feldwebel acted as Company Sergeant Major or Regimental Sergeant Major.
From 1877 veteran NCO’s could be promoted to the rank of Feldwebel-Leutnant. This Army Reserve Officer ranked with the Commissioned Officers, but was always inferior to the youngest Second Lieutenant.
Since 1887 the Offizierstellvertreter (Deputy Officer) ranked as kind of Warrant Officer First Class (more NCO than Officer) between Feldwebel and the Commissioned Officers.
There were three further NCO-ranks: Vizefeldwebel (Vice Feldwebel, Senior NCO), Sergeant (Junior NCO) and Unteroffizier (Lance Sergeant or Corporal, Junior NCO). The Gefreiter was not an NCO as he had no powers of authority, and was a higher grade of private soldier.

COLDRIDGE MEMORIAL TO THE MEN WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES IN THE WAR UNVEILED BY MRS. LAMBERT

"In Coldridge Parish Church yesterday afternoon a special Memorial Service was held for the dedication of a clock and tablet in remembrance of those brave men of the parish who gave their lives in the war. The unveiling of a tablet bearing the names of the men, and the setting of the clock in motion were performed by Mrs. Lambert, who was accompanied by her husband, the Right Hon. George Lambert M.P. for the South Molton Division. The ceremony was performed in the presence of a large congregation, including all classes and sections of the community.

The memorial is a worthy one, and redounds to the credit of the parish. It has been raised at a cost of between £260 and £270, practically the whole of which had been contributed previous to yesterday. The clock, which is placed in the tower, was supplied and fixed in position by a well-known Croydon firm. It has a double dial, one facing south and the other west, each dial having a diameter of 6ft. The brass tablet, placed inside the church, has the following inscription:

1919. Peace Memorial
The clock in the church tower was erected by the present and former parishioners of Coldridge to commemorate those who, counting not their lives dear unto them, died for their country in the Great War, 1914 - 1919

The charming little plan for a dignified, peaceable, ‘constitutional’ German revolution which preserves ‘law and order’, and which regards as its primary and most urgent task the protection of capitalist private property – this little plan is going to pot: Acheron has been set in motion! While up there in the governing circles an amicable arrangement with the bourgeoisie is being maintained by all means, the mass of the proletariat down below is rising and shaking a threatening fist: the strikes have begun! There are strikes in Upper Silesia, in the Daimler Works, etc., but this is only a beginning. The movement cannot but surge forward with ever-increasing power and intensity.

How could it be otherwise? A revolution has taken place. Workers, proletariat – in uniform or in overalls – made it. Socialists, representatives of the workers, are sitting in the government.

And what has changed in the wages and living conditions of the mass of workers? Nothing at all, or virtually nothing at all! Scarcely had a few miserable concessions been made here and there when the bosses attempted to juggle even that little bit away from the proletariat.

The masses are consoled with the prospect of the future golden fruits which are supposed to fall into their laps from the National Assembly. By means of long debates, talk and resolutions of parliamentary majorities we are supposed to slide softly and ‘calmly’ into the promised land of socialism.

The healthy class instinct of the proletariat rebels against the schema of parliamentary cretinism. ‘The liberation of the working class must be the work of the working class itself,’ says the Communist Manifesto. And the ‘working class’ is not a few hundred elected representatives who control society’s destiny with speeches and rebuttals. Even less is it the two or three dozen leaders who occupy government offices. The working class – that is the broad mass itself. Only with its active co-operation in overthrowing capital can the socialization of the economy be prepared.

Instead of waiting for the bounty promised by the government, or for the resolutions of the ‘great’ National Assembly, the mass is instinctively taking to the one real means that leads to socialism: the struggle against capitalism. Until now the government has devoted all its energies to castrating the revolution and, crying out against any threat to ‘law and order’, to establishing harmony among the classes.

The mass of the proletariat is calmly toppling the house of cards of revolutionary class harmony and waving the feared banner of the class struggle.

The nascent strike movement is evidence that the political revolution has burst into the social foundation of society. The revolution is recalling its own original purpose; it is thrusting aside the stage props of personnel changes and decrees which have not changed the social relation between capital and labour in the least, and it is itself coming on to the stage of events.

The bourgeoisie may well feel that this has touched its Achilles heel, that here the joke of the government’s harmlessness has gone too far, and that the terrible face-to-face fight between two mortal enemies is beginning in earnest. Hence the bourgeoisie’s pallid fear of and hoarse rage at the strikes. Hence the feverish efforts by their lackeys among the trade-union leaders at catching the approaching hurricane in the nets of their petty old bureaucratic-official methods thereby crippling and enchaining the mass.

Vain efforts! The petty fetters of trade-union diplomacy in the service of capitalist rule proved their worth admirably in the period of political stagnation that preceded the world war. In the period of revolution they will fail miserably. Every bourgeois revolution in modern times has been accompanied by a turbulent strike movement – in France at the end of the eighteenth century and in the July and February Revolutions, and in Germany, Austria, Hungary and Italy. Every great social upheaval naturally produces violent class struggles in a society founded upon exploitation and oppression. So long as bourgeois class society persists in the equilibrium of its everyday parliamentary routine, the proletarian will patiently walk the treadmill of the wage system, and his strikes will then have only the character of weak correctives to a system of wage-slavery which is generally considered to be unshakable.

The moment the equilibrium of the classes is dislocated by the storm of revolution, the strikes change suddenly from gently lapping surf into tidal waves; the very depths begin to move; the slave does not start up in anger merely because the pressure of his chains is too painful; he rebels against the chain itself.

So it has been in all hitherto bourgeois revolutions. As these revolutions which led to the entrenchment of bourgeois class society subsided, the proletarian slave-rebellion usually collapsed and the worker returned, head bowed to his treadmill.

In the present revolution, the strikes which have just broken out are not ‘trade-union’ battles for baubles, for a few trimmings on the wage system. They are the natural answer of the masses to the mighty convulsion that capitalism underwent on the collapse of German imperialism and in the brief political revolution of the workers and soldiers. They are the beginning of a full-scale war between capital and labour in Germany; they herald the onset of the mighty class struggle, the outcome of which can be nothing less than the destruction of the capitalist wage system and the creation of the socialist economy. They are releasing the living social force of the present revolution: the revolutionary class energy of the proletarian masses. They are inaugurating the period of direct activity of the broadest masses, an activity for which the socialization decrees of and measures taken by any representative body or the government can only provide the accompaniment.

This nascent strike movement involves at the same time the most hard-hitting criticism by the masses of the chimera of their so-called ‘leaders’ concerning the ‘National Assembly’. These ‘leaders’ already have the ‘majority’ – the striking workers in the factories and mines! The dolts! Why don’t they invite the bosses to a small ‘debate’ so that they can outvote them with an ‘overwhelming majority’ and can realize their demands easily and ‘according to order’? For the time being it is, after all,formally a question of genuine trifles, of purely superficial features of the wage system!

Let Herr Ebert or Haase try to approach the striking coal-miners of Upper Silesia with this trifling plan – they are sure to receive an answer. Yet that which is shattered by baubles and soap bubbles is supposed to hold fast, though the whole social structure collapse!

By its mere appearance on the scene of the social class struggle, the proletarian mass has passed over all the previous shortcomings, indecision and cowardice of the revolution and gone over to the matters at hand. The Acheron is in motion, and the dwarfs who carry on their little game at the head of the revolution will either tumble head over heels or finally learn to understand the colossal importance of the world historical drama in which they are cast.

As a leader seizes on the article the day containing Bavarian revelations over Germany’s policies in July 1914 (page 8) legal officials consider the feasibility of extraditing the former Kaiser – page 9

The risks of wartime sea travel were underlined this week with a tragic, unexplained incident. A local soldier fell overboard while travelling between Jersey and Guernsey, and despite an extensive search is lost, presumed drowned. What is not clear is whether Gunner Condon went into the sea by accident, or on purpose.

Thomas Michael Condon, who served with the Royal Garrison Artillery, was returning from a spell of leave in the island. He had been at the front since the beginning of 1916, being wounded twice during that time. He returned to the island around 26 November, for a few days with his parents who live at Beaulieu Lodge on Wellington Road. It was noticed the Gunner Condon was acting strangely, however, and did not appear to be his usual self.

On board, while most passengers went below Gunner Condon remained on deck. He was last seen in a precarious position on the ship’s railings. Despite an attempt made to grab hold of the soldier, he fell over the side into the water. A search was made after the vessel stopped and turned around, but, other than his cap, there was no sign of the victim.

Ethel Munday of Dalton Street receives a letter from her husband Thomas on the Western Front, who says:

George [Hartas] and I have captured a great big Hun prisoner, one about 6ft 6in, and I tell you we souvenired him. I am sending the things home to you. The souvenirs include a German cap, a pocket wallet with the photo or his wife and three children, a small photo. and his purse, with some Hun money in it … also his ring, which looks like a wedding ring. I want you to keep them, as they will speak for what we do here.

Written , it would appear, in connection with the discussion by the Soviet Government on November 27 (December 10), 1917, of instructions to the Soviet delegation empowered to negotiate a peace with Germany at the peace conference at Brest-Litovsk. The government decision on this question said: 'Instruction on the Talks, on the Basis of the Decree on Peace."
The peace conference opened on December 9 (22), 1917, and was attended by the Soviet delegation and those of the Quadruple Alliance (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey). At the first sitting tire Soviet delegation read out a declaration on the peace terms. The other side appeared to agree to conduct the talks on these terms, but in fact this preliminary period already revealed Germany's annexationist intentions. On January 5 (18), the delegates of the Quadruple Alliance made known their govern-merits' territorial claims to the Soviet delegation. This included a part of Russia which was to be ceded to Germany and Austria-Hungary (a territory of more than 150,000 square kilometers): Poland, Lithuania , a part of Estonia and Latvia, and also sizable areas inhabited by Ukrainians and Byelorussians.

(1) The talks shall be political and economic.

(2) The main theme of the political talks and the basic principle shall be: “No annexations or indemnities”.

(3) Concept of annexation:

(a) non-acceptability of the definition of annexation as lands integrated after the proclamation of the present war.
[The definition of annexation under which only lands integrated after the proclamation of the war are regarded as annexed is rejected.]

(b) any territory shall be deemed to be annexed whose population, over the last few decades (since the second half of the 19th century), has expressed dissatisfaction with the integration of their territory into another state, or its status in the state, regardless of whether such dissatisfaction has been expressed in writings, decisions of meetings, assemblies, municipal councils and similar institutions, in state and diplomatic acts, arising from the national movement in these territories, in national friction, clashes, disturbances, etc.133

(1) Official recognition for each (non-sovereign) nation, which is part of a given belligerent country, of the right to free self-determination, including secession and formation of an independent state; (2) the right to self-determination shall be realised through a referendum of the whole population of the territory seeking self-determination; (3) the geographical boundaries of the territory seeking self-determination shall be established by democratically elected representatives of the territory and contiguous territories; (4) preliminary conditions guaranteeing the exercise of the right of nations to free self-determination:

(a) withdrawal of troops from the territory seeking self-determination;

(b) return to the territory of refugees and inhabitants expelled by the authorities since the outbreak of war;

(c) establishment in the given territory of a caretaker administration consisting of democratically elected representatives of the nation seeking self-determination, with the right (among others) of implementing Clause (b);

(d) establishment under the caretaker administration of commissions of the contracting parties with the right of reciprocal control;

(e) the expenditure on implementing Clauses (b) and (c) shall be covered from a special fund set up by the occupying party._________________
“Stop whining.”
– A. Schwarzenegger

Object description - image: the interior of a dug-out with four British infantrymen sitting inside. Two men sit on either side, with the floor of the dug-out consisting of wooden duckboards. The steps leading up to the open doorway are in the centre background.

Label - William Anderson “…We were a most devoted pair before this awful war came to upset us and our dear little girl asks constantly for her Dada to come home” Agnes Anderson writing after her husband’s death, 29 June 1917 William Anderson was a stained glass designer from Blackpool. He and his wife Agnes had a young daughter called Lillian. He joined the Army in late 1915. William was drafted to France in October 1916 with a Pals unit, the 18th Battalion, Manchester Regiment. Throughout his service he sent drawings of his experiences to his family, together with letters describing his frustration at being apart from them. On 23 April 1917, William was killed in action at the age of 33. His death left a huge void in the lives of his wife and daughter.

November 1916 - Monday 27
Fair day. Light rain
in evening. Heavy rain on the
Ranges. Saw Mr G Pain of
Martinborough re sale of Admiral
station to Hair & the latters
option over it. He advised me
that they would see Te Parae
run of 1300 acres at Kahautura [Kahutara]
at £ 40 per acre. Sent advice
up to Wanganui agents, Messrs
London & Forlong, re same.
Down to Nurse Spellmans
at 4.30 with Gretta to see
Bertha & baby. At night I
sawed & burst up tough gum
stump for fire wood.
War news state that the
Venizelist provisional
government in Greece has
declared war on Bulgaria
& Germany.

Saxon Sydney-Turner cultivated a strange reputation in the Bloomsbury group. At times he spoke non-stop on arcane topics; other times he was completely, enigmatically silent. In this letter, Virginia Woolf writes to Turner with characteristic playfulness—both fawning over and tenderly chiding the notorious neurotic.

To Saxon Sydney-Turner

Hogarth House, Paradise Road, Richmond
Monday [27 November 1916]

My dear Saxon,

Whatever your state of mind, you must say I’m an obedient creature to sit down and write to you, directly I’ve finished tea—However, I admit I like writing to you very much, though its rather like writing to an elf bathed in moonlight on the top of some hill. And I’ve nothing to say—except that I owe you 5/5 for the chess book, which I will send you tomorrow, if I can remember, as I think I shall.

Probably I ought to insist upon rest and food at this juncture. If you dont sleep or eat, your feelings will become so much of a puzzle that you’ll waste these exquisite days merely scratching your head. For I’m convinced they are exquisite days—more entirely exquisite for you than for most, because all your feelings are so true. Have I ever heard you say an insincere thing? Never. Now I think you can trust yourself because you have made a habit of honesty. And, dear me, one never regrets feeling things in this life; not even if mere disappointment follows, which I think utterly impossible in this particular case. You will say I know nothing about it; and very properly give me one of your slight raps on the nose, but in spite of being in some ways foolish, I am sensible in others. I know, being civilised as we are, we can’t help watching our feelings, and being incredulous of them. But that I believe to be the proper way to feel, and later when things are less new, one loses this self-consciousness, and enjoys the fact that our feelings have been so watched, and are therefore so good—I’ve never had to go back on any of mine for Leonard, or indeed for any of my friends. I dont think this is very well expressed, but no doubt you will see what it means.

How delightful it is to think of you. Are you writing any poetry? I am reading Mendel, which is rather interesting, and makes me think of Barbara, not that she occurs in it, I suppose, but all the young do, and I wonder if they’re so very different from us. I think life for us was more complicated at that sort of age—

We went to a concert on Friday, and met Gertler and Carrington, and Walter Lamb, who came home with us—O dear! But the main point is that I hope you will write to me; and I think you a most adorable and tender hearted sprite? no, spirit.

Severe rain and thunderstorms begin to lash the Gallipoli coast. More than 280 men die during the two-day “great blizzard”; 16,000 others suffer frostbite and exposure. Captain Robert Gee of the 2nd Royal Fusiliers records in his diary:

It was a dark night in the trenches at Suvla Bay and the 26th Nov will long be remembered and perhaps spoken of in years to come. The men had just “stood to” and the Sgt Major reported “Garrison correct, Sir” when a terrible clap of thunder, worse than a bombardment of HE broke the stillness of the night. This was followed by zig-zags of lightening which appeared to split the heavens in two and then the rain fell as only it can fall in the tropics. Within half an hour the trenches held a foot of water rushing so quickly that it was difficult to stand. At 7 pm the Barricade gave way and a solid wall of water 7ft high swept the trench carrying everything and everybody before it.

By 8 pm the flood had reached its height and the force of the water had somewhat abated so that I was able to swim from a tree to No.1 Platoon. The men were on the parados of the trench up to their breasts in water, it was the same with No.2 Platoon, only about 9 rifles had been saved. No.3 Platoon had gathered on a high bit of land and having no trees to hang on to had formed groups and were clinging to each other. No.4 Platoon were fighting for their lives, their part of the line being a maze of trenches many of which had been washed away burying the men in the mud and making it very difficult for the man to retain a footing anywhere.

At 2 a.m. the water began to subside and the men were set to work to construct a breastwork behind the trenches. No tools being available we had to do this by scooping up handfuls of earth and by dawn a resemblance of cover had been formed and we found it useful for the enemy gave us about a dozen shrapnel. To add to our comforts it began to freeze hard and a snow blizzard came down and the whole of the place was soon covered by snow; many of the survivors of the flood died from exposure. With the help of the Sgt Major I counted the Company and of the 139, only 69 remained.

It was now discovered that the ration party had been drowned and all the food and drink we had was one gallon jar of rum, this we issued out and Pte Oldfield who had swum to HQ brought up orders that the line was to be held at all costs. This order was also afterwards brought to me by the Adjt. During this time – the first night – the cheerfulness of the men was marvellous, the slightest joke or mishap produced roars of laughter. By 8 o’clock I had a few rifles in working order and we were able to return the fire of the Turks, but I gave the order to cease firing as soon as the enemy ceased and during the whole of the 27th very little fire took place. All day the weather was freezing and more men died; towards night it turned to rain and it was impossible to move.

At 2 a.m. 28th the CO brought me half a bottle of whiskey and told me that the Adjt and himself were the only live persons at the Battalion HQ. At 3:30 a.m. the Adjt brought me two Officers to help me. All my own Officers and most of the NCOs had gone under, and told me to let the men who could not fight make their own way to the Red Cross station. I passed the order on to each Platoon and about 30 men left, hardly one of whom could walk upright, most of them having to crawl through the mud and water on all fours. I then counted up and found that I had only 27 living souls in the firing line and only 10 rifles in working order. About 5:30 the order to “Retire to Battalion HQ” came along and after waiting for X Company to get clear, the Company started in the following order: No.1 Platoon, No.4 Platoon, No.2 Platoon, No.3 Platoon. I stayed with the last 4 men. We had barely gone 30 yards before the 1st, 3rd and 4th man were killed, the two first through the head, and the latter through the heart; 10 yards further on the other man got it and as I lifted him to dress his wound the breath rushed out of his body with an awful sound. I remember falling in the mud and sticking a bayonet in the ground to help me out and the next clear thing I remember was Lt Wilkinson rubbing my feet and bending my toes and they did hurt.